Following KCET's decision in October to drop PBS, KOCE will take over the noncommercial network's primary affiliation in Los Angeles beginning Jan. 1.
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KOCE To Be PBS’s Home In Southern Calif.
Starting Jan. 1, 2011, KOCE Los Angeles will become the full-service PBS station for Southern California, and will begin broadcasting the full lineup of PBS programs for Los Angeles, Orange, Riverside, San Bernardino and Ventura counties and the City of Santa Barbara.
KOCE will offer PBS’s Emmy award-winning news and public affairs, history, drama and performing arts programming, including PBS Newshour, Frontline, Nova, Masterpiece, Nature, American Experience, American Masters, Tavis Smiley and Great Performances.
KOCE will also feature seven hours of PBS KIDS programming each weekday. PBS’s children’s programming includes Sesame Street, Curious George, Dinosaur Train, Arthur, Super Why!, The Cat in the Hat Knows a Lot About That and the upcoming Wild Kratts, which premieres in January.
KOCE said it will look to expand its outreach services in coming months, including KOCE Classroom — its educational initiative that serves nearly a half-million students and teachers in Southern California schools.
“KOCE-TV is delighted to expand our lineup of award-winning PBS programming that serves as a mainstay in homes across the country,” said KOCE president-CEO Mel Rogers. “We are excited to be the new home of PBS in Southern California and continue to work with PBS stations KVCR and KLCS to build a Southern California Consortium of stations for the region.”
“PBS continues to focus on ensuring the people of Southern California are able to benefit from the full range of high-quality PBS content and services,” said PBS president-CEO Paula Kerger. “We look forward to working with KOCE and our other PBS stations, KVCR and KLCS, to offer the very best of PBS’s national and locally produced content to the people of Southern California.”
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Comments (11)
Colin MacCourtney says:
December 1, 2010 at 11:29 am
KCET is undertaking a very risky experiment by dropping PBS. The additional $7 Mil that PBS wanted in fees is less than $7/year for each of their viewer members, a small amount when you consider PBS is the cornerstone of the station’s branding. I hope they have a better experience than when the last major market station, KRON in SF, tried to make its way without its major network; NBC.
Krista Prescott says:
December 1, 2010 at 4:25 pm
But PBS costs are skyrocketing and you can’t count on 5% of the viewers to cough-up more money in tough financial times. PBS is really hurting and this wont help their cause. This isn’t the first station to drop PBS’ programming (and certainly not the last). PBS is lacking innovation and competetiveness. WIth Discovery Channel, History Channel, Disney, Nick providing similiar programming… plus with a better quality (subjective) product, PBS needs to re-invent itself. This should be a monsterous wake-up call for PBS.
Hope Yen and Charles Babington says:
December 1, 2010 at 4:44 pm
Scheez! Here we go again. I don’t have the current financial figures at hand, but when Scripps’ CBS Blowtorch, WJXT in Jacksonville, disagreed with CBS’ reduced (or zero?) comp, they walked away from the affiliation, which they had had almost since God created the continents. Enter a small U, ever willing to pickup the CBS audience, and wow, did that station hit a home run. Viewers were upset for about a nanosecond, many already being on cable and subscribing to the pizza pan dish providers, Dish and Direct. CBS awarded an affiliation to an LPTV in Gainesville to gap-fill, what with the new CBS in Jax being a U, rather than a lo band V. Fast fwd to today and the digital era….betcha more people watch the new CBS than WJXT, at least in prime. Maybe Alan Henry could us straight and provide his assessment. Alan? IMHO, KCET made a mistake. KOCE is going to be a powerhouse!
Hope Yen and Charles Babington says:
December 1, 2010 at 4:46 pm
Sorry-make that Alan Frank, and the company is Post Newsweek, not Scripps. My bad.
Sean Smith says:
December 1, 2010 at 9:07 pm
No problem.. when I worked for Alan Henry, it was easy to blame him for everything, too LOL!!!!
Mike Lewis says:
December 1, 2010 at 4:56 pm
No Worries. When you look back at Mr. Frank’s ability to make sound decisions, you’ll notice history shows he doesn’t do it very well at all. The WJXT debacle was just one more evidence of it,
Cheryl Davis says:
December 1, 2010 at 5:27 pm
The PBS model is dead. PBS can no longer sucker the state and federal governments out of millions of dollars dollars so PBS stations can buy equipment they really don’t need. “People are also wise to the mulitple “Beg-A-Thons” to entice Grandmothers to give them their last five dollars to keep “Barney on the air. The History Channel, Discovery Channel, TLC and others serve our needs just fine. And they do it “Old School”, selling commercials!
Burl Osborne says:
December 1, 2010 at 5:34 pm
I don’t have an issue with PBS’ newscasts. I think they are the only real ones left. But the greed of the Corporation for Public Broadcasting to up the ante just because KCET got ONE generous donation is just greed. My issue is that KOCE is a great station and I don’t want to see it run down because PBS decides to exercise further control. KOCE has a great lineup and it is not duplicative of what KCET’s was. It was the equivalent of counter programming, especially those old live comedies.
Teri Green says:
December 1, 2010 at 5:34 pm
Too many PBS stations in LA. A market only needs one. Why split it any more than need be. LA was unique that it had SEVEN VHF and not one of them was PBS. That’s pretty odd. But it meant no VHF PBS could establish itself as a powerhouse, like in other cities. So the market was divded and the stations all suffered. Now with one less PBS, no one will notice for more than a day or so. It’s not like they’re a commercial station and can provide content people want to see
Robert Klein says:
December 1, 2010 at 5:55 pm
Maybe there are too many PBS stations in the L.A, area, but the original impetus must have been to serve the greater metro area. KVCR is an Inland Empire PBS, KLCS is an LAUSD-based education station, and KOCE is an Orange County station. One may argue there isn’t a need to have so many PBS stations in one area, but it’s managed to work for nearly 40 years. Besides, not all stations are received in all areas (especially KVCR).
Kimberly Gari-Luff says:
December 2, 2010 at 12:59 am
KCET is not received in most of San Diego County because of co-channel interference from a Channel 28 in Tijuana MX. KOCE, on the other hand, makes it down here very nicely, with multiple program offerings in English.. They both transmit from Mount Wilson at 5000+ feet and I have a nice clear view in that direction.My local PBS station, KPBS has one program in English and one in Spanish.